bagwan
Years ago
wheel of fortune for angela
"spin the wheel, where she lands, nobody knows"
wnbl.com.au report Angela looks like going trans tasman -
The Christchurch Sirens hope to sign Tall Fern "pocket rocket" Angela Marino for its team in the Australian women's basketball league, fending off the advances of several other sides, writes Geoff Longley for The Christchurch Press.
Tall Ferns coach Mike McHugh, who is overseeing the development of the franchise, said his project this week was to get Marino's signature before the New Zealand team leaves for another tournament in Asia, in Taiwan next week.
McHugh is optimistic the 1.65m point guard will choose to come to Christchurch and be one of the team's high-profile signings and bring her up-tempo game and three-point shooting skills.
But McHugh knows of at least three other teams vying to secure Marino's services.
Marino's situation is complicated by the fact that her father, Vince Marino, owns the Adelaide franchise in the league and the 21-year-old is based in Adelaide, where she is studying for a law degree.
McHugh said Marino was conscious that if she signed for Adelaide it had to be for the right reasons and not because her father owned the team.
Marino has already played for the Canberra Capitals in the Australian league under former Tall Ferns coach Tom Maher but when Carrie Graf took over as coach of the championship-winning team last year her role diminished. Marino then played with Perth last season but McHugh said things did not turn out there as envisaged either.
McHugh is hoping that the package he presents, which includes plenty of court-time directing essentially the Tall Ferns team, which is bound for the Beijing Olympics next year, will clinch the deal.
Born in Waiuku of Italian parents, Marino moved to Australia as an infant and was discovered playing representative age group basketball in South Australia.
She was called into the Tall Ferns shortly before the 2004 Athens Olympics and emerged as one of the team's star performers, finishing as one of the tournaments top three-point shooters.
Marino also led the Ferns in scoring at the Jones Cup (averaging 16 points per game) in Taiwan and Oceania Championships (14.0) in 2005, and again as she helped them to a silver medal at the Melbourne Commonwealth Games (14.8).
rather see her here - but the court time and olympic preparation thing would be in working against us here
